Cleaning Spills on Polished Concrete Floors

Spills are a part of a floor’s life. They are going to happen and they are going to have to be cleaned up. The good news is that you do have a small window of time if there is a spill. Think of a polished concrete commercial floor as a granite counter top. You only have so long before you need to clean up the spill or you risk the possibility of it seeping into the surface and becoming a permanent part of it. The exact window of time you have depends on how well you maintain the floors. For instance, the cleaning chemical that you use can buy you some time.

For example: cleaning a granite countertop with the proper product would increase the countertop’s ability to suspend liquids, thus giving more time to clean up the mess due to it taking more time for it to penetrate. The same concept applies to a polished concrete floor.

If a floor is susceptible to spills, such as the floors in grocery stores, having a stain guard or “stain protector” is a must. Stain guards are applied as the last step in the polishing process and go down super thin and then they are buffed into the surface. They don’t leave a thick film on the surface, so it’s not waxy. While there is a lot of controversy regarding stain guards, because some contractors have used them to cheat in achieving a better shine, but they are useful. With a stain guard down, the floor will allow the maximum window of time to clean up a spill.

The reason why the maximum amount of time is needed is because in a grocery store, a substance may spill and it will be a long time before it is discovered by an employee or a customer. On a perfectly maintained floor, you have about 15 minutes to get the mess cleaned up. In a grocery store, more time may be needed. In fact, it is common for special attention to be given to the pickle aisle since pickle juice is so acidic and pickle jars tend to take a tumble now and then. In areas such as these, the floor’s suspension abilities have to be maximized.

It is important for floor suspension to be maximized since getting out a pickle juice stain can be very expensive, which is why it is worth improving the floor’s suspension abilities.

When comparing the suspension of a polished floor to an unpolished floor, the amount of time that you will have to clean up will be increased significantly with a polished floor. While you want to make sure spills are cleaned up quickly, the integrity of your floor will be upheld. Polished floors offer other protections, such as impact resistance and a degree of beauty that a plain unpolished concrete floor does not have.